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Subject: Geron, And Stem Cells, Keep On Going
Future Tech
Geron, And Stem Cells, Keep On Going
>Matthew Herper</A>, <A HREF="http://www.forbes.com/news">Forbes.com</A>,
10.10.01, 4:12 PM ET
NEW YORK - Embryonic stem cells, which can, in theory, replace any damaged
tissue in the body, were big news during the halcyon days of August.
Headlines now belong to far more pressing matters, but these intriguing cells
continue to divide indefinitely in laboratories across the world, and
research goes on apace whether or not the public is watching.
Geron (nasdaq: <A
HREF="http://www.forbes.com/finance/mktguideapps/compinfo/CompanyTearsheet.jhtml?tkr=GERN">GERN</A>
- <A
HREF="http://markets2.forbes.com/rpt/Company_News.asp?Symbol=GERN">news</A>
- <A
HREF="http://www.forbes.com/peopletracker/results.jhtml?startRow=0&name=&ticker=GERN">people</A>),
the Menlo Park, Calif.-based company
that funded the creation of the first human embryonic stem cells, is making
steady headway toward trying these cells as therapies for human diseases. The
latest: Speaking at the UBS Warburg Global Life Sciences conference, Chief
Executive Thomas B. Okarma said the company had implanted programmed stem
cells into the brains of animals, where they had turned into neurons.
The experiments show that stem cells can turn into the right kinds of nerve
cells after implantation, Okarma says. In theory, this would allow the
implantation of nerve cells that produce dopamine--a chemical that is lacking
in the brains of Parkinson's patients. It's hoped that replacing lost
dopamine-producing neurons might help those with Parkinson's disease. But
benefits have not been shown even in animals, Okarma cautions, and the
results will not be published in any scientific journals for some time.
Not that the company hasn't been publishing. A recent report by Geron
scientists in Nature Biotechnology, a prestigious journal, announced that the
company had grown embryonic stem cells without keeping them in contact with a
line of mouse "feeder" cells. In both houses of Congress, the need to keep
human cells in close contact with mouse cells worried many legistlators.
Senators Hillary Clinton (D-N.Y.) and Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.) had, in
particular, grilled Health Secretary Tommy G. Thompson at a Senate hearing on
the potential of embryonic stem cells. Their concern was two-fold: Many fear
that cultivating human cells close to mouse cells might allow animal viruses
to move into the human population. Because of this concern, it was felt that
regulators at the Food and Drug Administration might be reticent to approve
therapies derived from the cells as a result.
If a company could culture stem cells without mouse cells, it was feared,
they might face an advantage in getting regulatory approval over federally
funded academic scientists, who President George W. Bush restricted to using
several dozen stem-cell lines, all of them cultivated with mouse cells.
Geron, it seems, may now have the capacity to do exactly that.
But growing stem cells without a layer of mouse feeder cells is hardly a
trump card for the firm. Chief Financial Officer David Greenwood says the
company is getting to a stage where it may be more hesitant about publishing
new results--scientific papers will not be submitted, Greenwood says, until
Geron's researchers are far enough ahead that releasing results won't help
the competition.
And there is plenty of competition for the firm, even as it moves forward in
a collaboration with Rockville, Md.-based genome-mapper Celera (nyse: <A
HREF="http://www.forbes.com/finance/mktguideapps/compinfo/CompanyTearsheet.jhtml?tkr=CRA">CRA</A>
- <A HREF="http://markets2.forbes.com/rpt/Company_News.asp?Symbol=CRA">
news</A> - <A
HREF="http://www.forbes.com/peopletracker/results.jhtml?startRow=0&name=&ticker=CRA">people</A>)
to understand what genes make stem cells tick. Worcester,
Mass.-based animal cloning company Advanced Cell Technology, headed by Geron
founder Michael West, has made a name for itself in the embryonic stem cell
research, collecting a stable of high-caliber researchers including Teru
Wakayama, who Rockefeller University Professor Peter Mombaerts has called the
Tiger Woods of mouse cloning.
More From Forbes <A
HREF="http://forbes.com/2001/06/12/0612dnabrave.html">Special Report: Stem
Cells And Cloning</A>
...............................................................
Ray Strand
Prairie Sky Design
-----------------( on the Edge of the Prairie Abyss )---------------
when the sky is clear
the ground is visible
49/dx PD 2 yrs/40? onset
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